Sleeping Beauty of Trinity
by ladycordelia17
Summary: A response to SasukeBlade's "Fanfic of a Fanfic" challenge, based on The Trinity Tree's "Tales of Trinity." De Nam admires Sera Li as she sleeps. Does NOT tie in with any of my other handiwork. Rated for minor adult themes.


_**A response to SasukeBlade's "Fanfic of a Fanfic" challenge, based on **Tales of Trinity** by The Trinity Tree. During the Trinity caravan's second visit to Shella (in their fourth year), the Selkie girl Sera Li meets her sweetheart De Nam, the ambitious alchemist, and he invites her to stay as his guest. Here De Nam contemplates the sleeping Sera Li.**_

_Disclaimer: SasukeBlade owns the challenge and The Trinity Tree owns **Tales of Trinity**. Square Enix owns De Nam and everything else associated with _Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles._ Only thing that's mine is this fic (and the muse that stirred me to write)._

**Sleeping Beauty of Trinity**

She is so beautiful, in sleep as in waking. That was what I couldn't help but see when I went back to my room to check on her, the lovely Sera Li.

The day's battles must have taken their toll, that she had fallen asleep too quickly to hear my steps, or to hear the tap of brass on wood as I set my candlestick down on the nightstand. Silently I sank to my knees beside the bed to better observe her radiant face, to better admire the curves of her sleeping form.

Mesmerized I was, to watch the flickering candlelight play over her porcelain skin and glint and glimmer about her shining silvery hair. I longed to thread my hands through it, the mane that looked and doubtless felt like smooth threads of spun pearl-grey silk. Then I let my gaze wander to pale but long lashes that fringed the lids now closed over her gleaming lapis-colored eyes; her small, straight nose; the delicate flush that graced her high cheekbones. The barest hint of a dreaming smile that tugged at her soft rosy lips. I remembered the first time I kissed those lips of hers, the good-bye at the end of her caravan's first visit to Shella, and licked my own lips in a vain effort to assuage the sudden craving for the feel of her lips upon mine again. Sera Li had not been shy, I remembered—being a crystal caravanner must have made her bold, I thought now as then.

Eventually my wandering gaze drifted from her lips and the smooth-but-firm outline of her chin downward, over her pale slender neck, lingering at the hollow of her throat for a moment before meandering over her right shoulder and to the long arm, doubtless strong despite its slenderness, resting lightly over her well-toned stomach. The other arm was flung down at her side, just atop the cotton sheet and soft wool blanket that covered her hips and obscured the well-formed shapes of her long legs. I let my eyes wander back up that other arm to her other shoulder, where lay a scar half-concealed by the sleeve of her tight-laced blouse. _What battle had given her that scar?_ I wondered. Somehow, though, I found that the scar did little to mar her beauty, even as I cursed whatever foul miasma-beast had inflicted it on her.

Before I knew what I was doing, somehow I found myself gently taking hold of the hand flung down at her side and caressing it in both of my own as my gaze lingered over the place just above her heart, as I watched the rise and fall of her pert breasts with every deep and even breath. The hand that I held was callused and strong from a good four years of journeywork and battle, but small and not overly rough. I felt myself growing even warmer at the memory of her hands caressing my face as she kissed me, of her nimble fingers stroking the back of my neck and lightly tugging at my hair. What would it be like, I wondered, to feel more of her hands on me? To feel her exploring every inch of me that I dared reveal? Would she be shy, or as bold as she doubtless was on whatever place became her caravan's battlefield? Would she keep kissing me with the same fervor with which I longed to kiss every inch of her? Would she writhe and moan pleasurably beneath my touch, my kisses, the way I heard men describe their wives and lovers to have done?

It took a surprising amount of effort for me to stand up and gently lay Sera Li's lovely hand over her beating heart before I tucked the bedcovers over her. It was all that I could do not to lean in and kiss her to waking, as I so desired. For I did desire her—and if she had wanted me to, I would have thus taken her in my arms, would have given her, given us both, what would doubtless be a lovely memory, were a memory the only thing in my power to give. But for now there were too many things telling me that I really shouldn't, both for my sake and for hers.

With a sigh, I took my candle and turned to walk away. I knew that the hour grew late, and I needed my sleep as much as she.


End file.
